A Perfect Day
by White-Knight-1988
Summary: In a last ditch effort to win Kimberly back after making a terrible mistake, Tommy pulls out all the stops in the hope that one perfect day will remind her of the good times in their relationship and, hopefully, earn him a second chance.


_**Title: "A Perfect Day"**_

_**Original Posting Date: September 22, 2010**_

_**A/N: I was bored the other night and in a bit of a sappy mood so I sat down at the computer and this is what came out of it. I have ideas for two additional chapters—the wedding and the honeymoon—so let me know if you want me to continue this, and if you do, I'll work it in between the other stories.**_

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I messed up.

No, correct that; I really, really, _really_ messed up.

And I don't mean forgetting-to-change-the-oil-in-my-car messed up; or not-letting-the-dog-out-to-pee-before-going-to-bed messed up; hell, it's not even hooking-up-with-a-Tijuana-prostitute-and-ending-up-with-gonorrhea messed up.

No, it's more like the Hey-Tommy-you-just-destroyed-the-best-thing-to-ever-happen-to-you messed up.

Before we go any further, though, let me start at the beginning, just in case you don't already know the basics. Actually, forget that…you already know the basics, and if you don't, there are plenty of resources out there to educate yourself.

Moving on…

I had just finished my third year of teaching science at Reefside High School in Reefside, California. Following the destruction of the Dino Thunder powers, other teams of Power Rangers had inevitably appeared to combat the newest invaders Hell bent on conquering Earth, leaving me to the peaceful retirement from active duty that I had hoped for long before reclaiming the Ranger mantle as the Black Dino Ranger.

The defeat of Mesogog left me hopeful that this would truly be the end of my days as an active Ranger, and it left me even more hopeful that I would finally be able to settle down and have a normal life; or at least as close to a normal life as Earth's longest-serving ex-Power Ranger could realistically expect to have.

As I grew closer to thirty years old, I started to long for the life that I had watched my parents share for as long as I could remember; the same life that most of my friends were experiencing now too.

To everyone's great surprise, Zack had been the first of us — not including Billy, of course — to settle down for good. He and Angela had reconnected following his return to Angel Grove from Switzerland in 2000, and less than two years later, they were married. It's been eight years and three kids for the Taylor's since then and I even had the pleasure of being named godfather for baby number three, two year-old Darren William Taylor.

Being named godfather is, in and of itself, the first in a chain of events that led me to where I am right now, but we'll get back to that shortly.

After Zack and Angela's wedding, it was only a matter of time before everyone else seemed to follow suit. Jason married his college girlfriend Rebecca just six months after Zack's wedding. Adam and Tanya were next, about a year later, followed soon thereafter by Rocky and Aisha.

Mesogog had made it so that I was forced to miss out on Katherine's wedding in England to Alex, one of her fellow dancers at the Royal Ballet Academy in London where she taught, but I think the belated gift of a second honeymoon more than made up for it when we saw each other at Billy and Trini's wedding a few years later.

Speaking of Billy, his return was one of the most unexpected occurrences any of us had ever experienced. He simply showed up at Jason's house in Stone Canyon one day, refusing to explain what had happened on Aquitar or why he was back on Earth. We all think Trini knows the truth, but none of us have ever pushed her or Billy to disclose it.

Honestly, though, it wasn't that hard to let the situation go. Billy's sudden reappearance ranks close to the bottom on the list of ridiculously crazy things that I have dealt with in the last fifteen or so years. Plus, if I had learned one thing in my long tenure as a Ranger, it was that sometimes it was best just not to ask questions.

Now, if you're doing the math yourself, you know that that only leaves two of us who have not settled down yet. But even though Kimberly and I had dated more than a decade prior, rebuilt our friendship, and seen each other dozens of times since our breakup, I had never wanted anything more than to be friends with her once she had moved back to California in 2003.

The attraction that I had felt to her as a teenager was still there, of course — how could it not be when she seemed to only get more and more beautiful every time I saw her? — but the connection was not. In my heart, I knew that I would always love her, but after all those years, I simply did not have romantic feelings for her any more.

And I know she did not have them for me, either. We had shared one drunken night together following Adam and Tanya's wedding and, even though we both agreed that it had been a great night, we also had agreed that it was probably not something that should happen again.

After spending so much time fixing our friendship following our breakup, I don't think either one of us wanted to continue testing the boundaries of that friendship by pushing things any further. We merely went our separate ways that afternoon and maintained the same level of friendship we had had for several years, as if we had not ever slept together at all.

Which leads me back to young Darren Taylor, born April 7, 2008, the first of my two godsons; I also have the honor of being godfather to Jason's first child, Michael Thomas Scott, but that's a story for another time.

I can still remember coming home from work on that hot September afternoon in 2007 to find a message on my answering machine from Zack, asking me to call him back as soon as I could. I did not wait long to return his call, and it was then that I received the news that he and Angela were expecting their third child; not only that, but they wanted me to be godfather as well.

Of course, I said yes without hesitation, and when Zack told me that Kimberly was going to be godmother, I thought nothing of it other than to say that I thought she would make an excellent godmother to their child. We were good friends, on more than amicable terms, and if God-forbid anything ever happened to Zack and Angela, I knew that Kimberly and I would both do everything in our power to make sure that Darren was always taken care of.

But something happened that day when several dozen of Zack and Angela's family and friends gathered at the church to witness Darren's baptism. Kimberly and I were standing on opposite sides of baby Darren, listening to the minister speak, when our eyes suddenly met.

We shared no more than a quick look and smile, but I felt something in that moment that I had not felt in years, something I could not explain but that made me feel as though electricity were running throughout my entire body.

There was a reception party at the Taylor household in Angel Grove following the ceremony, and it was there where I felt that connection to Kimberly start to reemerge for the first time in over a decade.

Over the course of several hours, we engaged each other in numerous conversations that seemed to grow longer and more flirtatious as the night continued on, along with our ever-growing consumption of beer and wine.

I ended up finding out quite a few things about Kimberly that she had never told me before, the most important of which being that she had finally gotten her teaching credentials. I knew she had been taking night and online classes in between her two jobs as a bank manager and a coach at the local gymnastics school, but I had no idea how close she was to finishing up her education.

Kimberly hated her bank job, but she had stuck with it for years because it paid the bills and allowed her some flexibility as far as school was concerned. Now, though, she finally had the opportunity to leave that all behind and do something that she truly loved.

I could not have been happier for her.

But then came a piece of news that made me happy for myself as well.

Not only did she have her teaching credentials, but she had also received and accepted an offer to teach the second grade at Blue Bay Elementary School, which was just fifteen miles away from my home in Reefside.

Angel Grove was over a hundred miles away from Reefside, so ninety-five percent of our interaction as friends in the past few years had either come via telephone or the Internet, but now that she was going to be so close, we were finally going to have the chance to become the friends that we had been before we started dating.

To say that I was excited would be a vast understatement. I was utterly thrilled at the prospect of being able to spend real quality time with Kimberly. I imagined hanging out at each other's houses, going out on weekends, and generally just getting to become better friends again.

That we ended up back at Kimberly's apartment that same night was not in my plans, nor was sleeping together for a second time, but it happened nonetheless. I won't say too much about it, but I will say that the encore performance was even better than the first.

However, when I woke up the following morning, I was expecting another conversation where we agreed that sleeping together was a bad idea and that we needed to just remain friends. That was not what happened though.

I stumbled into the kitchen that morning to find Kimberly wearing my shirt from the night before like a dress as she cooked breakfast on the stove top. She looked so sexy in my shirt, and I wanted nothing more than to walk up behind her and wrap my arms around her, but I also did not want to do anything that might make her uncomfortable.

Instead, I simply cleared my throat and groaned a "Good morning" to announce my presence, leaving me more than surprised when Kimberly turned around, smiled brightly, and gave me a soft kiss on the lips.

Over a breakfast of eggs, bacon, and toast, we talked about the night before. Again, to my surprise, it was Kimberly who spoke up, admitting that she did not want to sweep the previous night under the rug as we had our first night together. She had felt the same connection that I had, and while she did not want to commit to anything serious so soon, she did want to try things out and see where they went, especially now that she was going to be living so close to me.

I was in complete agreement with everything that she said.

We got together again a few times during that summer, and when it came time for her to leave Angel Grove, I was there to help her move her things into her new apartment, which just so happened to be in Reefside, only three miles from my house.

All in all, it was the perfect setup for Kimberly and I to continue developing our friendship, although I think we both went into the situation hoping that we developed something more than just friendship.

And we did.

Kimberly was living in Reefside all of three weeks when we decided to make our relationship official. The conversation took place over dinner at _La Cocina,_ a Mexican restaurant in downtown Reefside that had quickly become one of our favorite places to eat, especially after our second "first" date there had gone so well.

That was twenty-two months ago, and since then, things between us had been great for the most part. You have to understand, our relationship is not a perfect one, even though most of our friends seemed to think it is. We argue just as much, if not more, than any other couple and there are times where I think we both want nothing more than to rip the other person's head off.

At the end of the day, though, we had always been able to work out our differences and move forward in our relationship. Until about a month ago, that is, when I made what might have been the biggest mistake of my entire life.

You see, it was never my intention to cheat on Kimberly. In fact, even to this day, the fact that I did it is still enough to leave my stomach in knots and my brain wondering how I could have ever been so stupid.

But it happened.

It was about two weeks before the school year was set to begin in September and Kimberly had gone away for the weekend, on a "girls only" trip with Aisha, Trini, and Rebecca. This, of course, meant that Billy, Jason, Rocky and myself were all going to be without our significant others for two-and-a-half days, so it was only natural that we decided to have a "guys only" weekend as well.

Billy came down with some kind of stomach bug that Friday, though, and to this day I still think it was that which ultimately led me to the position I'm in now.

See, the rapid aging that Billy went to Aquitar to cure had also left his body with certain side effects, the primary one being that he required far more hydration than the average Earth human. If he consumed more than two or three alcoholic beverages without drinking enough water in between, he would become severely dehydrated, often to the point of passing out.

As such, Billy usually chose to remain fairly sober when a group of us got together, and he had developed such a close relationship with Kimberly over the years that I know he would have stopped me before I could do anything too stupid. Unfortunately, Billy wasn't there, and neither Jason nor Rocky had been sober enough to play his role.

I don't even want to explain in detail how I came to cheat on Kimberly, but I ended up back at another woman's house that night and woke up in the morning with only the vaguest of recollections as to what had occurred the night before. On top of that, I had at least a dozen voicemails and text messages from Jason and Rocky in an attempt to locate me.

I was so sick to my stomach when I realized what I had done that I nearly vomited right there in this strange woman's bed. Luckily, she was in the bathroom when I woke, and I was able to dress and leave the place before I had to face the woman who had helped me commit one of the stupidest acts of my entire life.

I didn't even bother to call Jason or Rocky when I left, either. I went straight home and proceeded to spend the next thirty minutes in the shower, practically scrubbing my skin raw as though it would somehow erase the invisible dirt that covered my entire body.

The first real thought that popped into my head was that I had to tell Kimberly. Not even for a second did I think about trying to hide what I had done before. In fact, it was my hope that, if I was completely open and honest with her, she would give me another chance.

It didn't happen that way, though.

Figuring that a phone call was not the best way to have such a conversation — and not wanting to ruin her mini-vacation, either — I decided to wait until she had gotten home on Sunday evening before I told her what had happened.

I thought about picking up some flowers before I went to see her, but I decided against it, not wanting it to seem like I was trying to buy her forgiveness; especially not so cheaply. She was so happy to see me after nearly three days apart that, for the first time, I almost considered not telling her what I had done.

When she tried to pull me towards her bedroom, it took every ounce of strength I had to control myself and put a halt to things before they moved beyond the point of no return. And yes, I know…I could control myself with Kimberly, but not some random girl at a sports bar. Like I said, though, it definitely was not my finest hour.

Anyway, I made her sit with me in the living room and that was when I told her. It took all of thirty seconds for her eyes to start brimming with tears, and then half that time for her anger to take control.

I tried to apologize several times but she was not hearing it. She yelled and screamed at me, calling me all sorts of terrible things, all of which I felt more than applied to me at that point in time. There was nothing she could say to me that would make me feel more horrible than I already did.

Until, that is, she had succeeded in forcing me out of her apartment after numerous counts of telling me that she never wanted to see me again. We were standing on opposite sides of the doorway when she looked at me with tears streaming down her face, shaking her head at me as she muttered "I loved you, Tommy. I thought we were going to get married. I thought we were going to have a family…"

And then she slammed the door in my face, leaving me staring at the wooden barrier with my eyes wide and my mouth hanging open for quite some time. We'd talked about marriage and kids before, but never in a really serious manner, and now that I knew what she had wanted, I had finally found something that made me feel worse.

There was nothing in the world that I wanted more than to marry Kimberly and have a family with her. That was a month ago and my feelings had not changed in that time; and, if my collection of ears throughout the Ranger community were as accurate as they usually are, neither had hers.

Unfortunately, she had not really given me the chance to apologize to her since that Sunday evening. Phone calls, text messages, emails, showing up at her apartment…they had all gone ignored and unnoticed.

Which is why I was where I was at seven o'clock on a Friday morning in mid-October, parked a half dozen or so cars away from Kimberly's in the garage below her apartment building. You see, desperate times call for desperate measures, and at that point I had reached superhuman levels of desperation. I was so worried that she'd see me and leave before I could get to her that I had even gone as far as to switch cars with a fellow teacher for the day.

Yes, that desperate.

I know I must sound like a stalker. I certainly felt like one, too. But sometimes love makes you do crazy things, things you could never imagine yourself doing for any other person under any other circumstances.

From the driver's side of the white Chevrolet Avalanche I had borrowed, I was seated in a slouched position to hide myself from view when I saw the elevator door open a few hundred feet across the garage. Kimberly walked out moments later, wearing jeans and a pink sweatshirt that read _Blue Bay Elementary School_ across the chest.

I could feel my heartbeat start to quicken almost instantly as she walked across the parking lot, passing right by the Avalanche without a second glance en route to her silver 2006 Toyota Camry. When she was far enough beyond me, I quietly exited the truck and crept after her.

She neither saw nor heard me coming.

Kimberly was on the verge of climbing into her car when I came up behind her, lifted her off the ground with one arm, and started carrying her back to the truck. She tried to scream out, as I knew she would, but my left hand was over her mouth before she could get a sound out.

While Kimberly could hold her own in a one on one fight, the element of surprise and the fact that I was simply much stronger than her were on my side, and it was with little effort at all that I carried her back to the Avalanche. After carefully depositing her onto the front passenger seat, I quickly closed the door behind her and raced around to the driver's side.

By the time I was back inside, Kimberly was sitting up and staring at me with an expression somewhere in between frightened and bewildered.

"T-Tommy?" she half-sputtered, looking around wildly. "What the hell are you doing? There are security cameras in this parking lot, you know! They're going to see you kidnapping me!"

"No, they won't," I replied, shaking my head as I locked the car doors. "Hayley made sure they went down for a five minute window." Kimberly's eyes went wide as I added, "And I'm not kidnapping you, either."

She gave something of a laughing scoff and said, "Really? You could've fooled me. If this isn't kidnapping then what would you call it?"

"Proving a point," I said firmly. "You've been avoiding me for the past month, Kim. I know I fucked up, but I at least deserve the chance to be heard out. In case you've forgotten, you cheated on me too once, remember?"

"I was seventeen and we were on opposite sides of the country for God knew how long!" Kimberly yelled. "I didn't get drunk and fuck some random guy while you were out of town for the weekend!"

"I know," I murmured, nodding. "I know, Kim. I've spent every day for the last month thinking about what I did. I can barely bring myself to look in the mirror because I hate looking at the man who hurt you so badly."

"Your guilt isn't going to change what happened, Tommy," she stated matter-of-factly.

"I know," I said again, nodding once more.

Silence lapsed at that point. In the days leading up to this moment, I had planned out everything as perfectly as I thought was possible, but now that I had to put those plans into action, I found myself wondering if I was doing the right thing. Maybe I didn't deserve a second chance with Kimberly. Maybe what I had done was so bad that she simply could not find it in her heart to forgive me.

Finally, she let out a sigh and broke the silence. "What am I doing here anyway, Tommy?" she asked in a fairly normal tone of voice. "We both have jobs to go to and people are going to ask questions when neither of us shows up."

"No, they won't," I said, shaking my head. "I called in a favor to Superintendent Randall. Seems that the Dino Rangers saving her from Mesogog's control had a plus-side to it after all; a substitute is already on their way to take care of your class for today, and I've been told by Randall that I have as long as it takes."

"As long as it takes to what?" questioned Kimberly with narrowing eyes.

"Look, Kim," I started, resisting the urge to reach out and take her hand, "All I'm asking for is one day; one day of us spending time together and doing the things we did before I screwed everything up. If, by midnight tonight, you still don't want to be with me anymore, then I promise that I will never bother you again. But please…give me today."

For the longest time Kimberly said nothing, choosing instead to stare at me continuously as if she would inevitably be able to X-ray me with her eyes. Eventually, though, she shifted her attention to the car parked on her right, let out a sigh, and said, "Fine…but don't think for a second that me agreeing to this is in any way an indication that I want to get back together with you. After what you did to me, you'll be lucky if we even end up as friends."

Knowing that I would have to pay my penance, I nodded my acceptance of this. "I understand completely," I replied, starting the car at that point, "Oh, and Kim?"

"Yeah?" she countered somewhat irritably, turning her head to face me.

"Thank you," I answered, smiling softly. "I know I don't deserve your forgiveness, but just the chance to try and earn it means the world to me. You might not think much of me right now and I don't blame you for that, but I want you to know that I love you more than anything on this planet. Whatever I have to do, I'll do it."

Kimberly did not say anything for several moments, once again focusing on the black BMW parked alongside her. "Just drive, Tommy," she finally muttered a short time later.

Taking this as a cue not to push things any further for the moment, I simply murmured an OK and then slowly backed the truck out of its parking spot. Once we had reached the exit to the garage, I turned right onto the main road and then quickly merged into the left-turn lane, the light to which was currently red.

As we reached a temporary stop, I moved my hand to the in-dash CD player and chose the disc in the third of six slots. I had spent the entire night before making an MP3 disc with over eighty songs: some of them were favorites of Kimberly; some of them were songs we both enjoyed; and some of them were songs that had been playing during certain memorable moments throughout both the teenaged and adult phases of our relationship.

Kimberly did not seem to think anything of it as we drove through downtown Reefside, but about ten or so minutes into our drive, a song came on that immediately grabbed her attention. It was "Big Pimpin'" by Jay-Z and the faintest of smiles crossed her lips as soon as she realized what the song was.

Kimberly was not a rap fan by any means, nor would the average person view this song as particularly emotional or sentimental, but I had a feeling that she would remember it with fondness and in this case, I was right.

It had taken months of pleading and the fact that it was my birthday to convince Kimberly to go with me to a Jay-Z concert when he played in Los Angeles over a year-and-a-half prior. She had eventually conceded, though, and we were about ten rows back from the stage when Jay-Z performed the song midway through his set. To this day, I still don't know why I chose that moment, but it was then that I told Kimberly that I loved her for the first time since we had gotten back together.

And while in no way did I think one song would make her forgive what I had done, it was my hope that enough happy memories being recalled — and maybe a few new ones being created — would eventually put her in a place where she was willing to at least give me another chance. I wasn't expecting things to go back to the way they were overnight, but I did want the opportunity to show her that I still loved her, that my mistake was a one-time occurrence and one that would never happen again as long as I still had a breath in my body.

Maintaining my silence so as not to anger Kimberly any further, we continued driving through Reefside for another ten minutes or so when she finally broke the silence by asking, "Where are we going?"

"Are you hungry?" I asked cautiously, barely looking sideways at her.

"No, I ate breakfast right before I left," she stated emotionlessly.

"Oh, okay," I said, nodding, while at the same time silently cursing my bad luck.

I had been hoping to bring back another happy memory by having breakfast at a 24-hour diner on the outskirts of town, the same one we went to at two-thirty in the morning every single time that Kimberly had dragged me out for another trip to some nightclub I didn't want to go to. That was not going to be in the cards today, though.

With no real contingency plan in mind, I looked at Kimberly and asked, "If you could pick one thing to do right now, what would it be?"

"To go to work," Kimberly muttered, staring out her window.

Forcing myself not to roll my eyes, I faked an amused chuckle and said, "Okay, besides that."

"To go home," she answered plainly.

This time I did roll my eyes, but fortunately Kimberly was not paying much attention to me. "Okay, let's try this again," I began, trying to keep any hint of irritation out of my voice, "Taking into account that we're spending the day together…if you could do any one thing _with me_ right now, what would it be?"

Kimberly finally looked at me and I saw the faintest hint of amusement in her expression. We both knew that she was going to test me as much as she possibly could today, and I was going to do everything in my power not to give into her antics.

"Let's go to the nursery," she said.

For a moment, I faltered. I despised gardening so much that I paid people to do it all for me, so of course she would pick the nursery. Why wouldn't she choose the one place in the entire city that I would rather jump off a bridge than go to under normal circumstances?

And even though I knew how much she loved gardening, there was also the fact that her fourth-floor balcony simply did not have the space for anymore plants. Of course, she knew this as much as I did, so I figured that dragging me to one of my least favorite places for no reason at all was almost certainly another one of the many tests I would endure on this day.

Smiling back at her, I gave an agreeable reply and headed for the freeway, the quickest route to the nursery which, by the way, just so happened to be on the complete opposite end of town and well out of the way for everything else that I had planned for today.

If there was a bright spot, though, it was that Kimberly's mood seemed to lighten considerably during the thirty minute drive. Several more songs came on that brought back fond memories, and by the time we reached the nursery, we were having a reasonably decent conversation with no obvious tones of anger or irritation coming from Kimberly's side.

It wasn't much, but it was certainly a start.

For nearly two hours we walked around the nursery, Kimberly pointing out plants and flowers that she liked, or that she thought would make a nice addition to the garden that she did not have. All the while I resisted the urge to tell her that I would buy her every plant in the entire place _and_ give her free reign with my yard if she would just take me back.

Eventually, though, it got to a point where there was not much more we could do at the nursery; thankfully, it was Kimberly who suggested we leave in the end, although not before purchasing a few smaller plants for her apartment that she refused to let me pay for. She did, however, let me carry all of them back to the truck for her.

No complaints here, though.

By the time everything had been loaded into the truck and we were back on the road, it was almost ten-thirty, leaving me plenty of time to get us where we needed to be in order to move forward with my plans for the day.

"I'm surprised you put up with that for so long," Kimberly commented a few minutes later as I drove us back towards the freeway. "You hate going to the nursery."

Chuckling, I shrugged as I looked to her and said, "Yeah, I do, but I _love_ you. Going to the nursery might not be my idea of a good time, but for you I'd go anywhere."

I don't think she wanted to, but my comment left Kimberly half-smiling as she bit her lip ever so slightly, a move she often did but that had never lost its sexiness in my eyes. Still, she gave no real indication to how she felt as we made our way across Reefside via the freeway.

We had just driven by the last Reefside exit when another song came on that garnered a reaction from Kimberly. A couple of months before she had left for Florida, she and I had gone to see Hootie and the Blowfish on our anniversary and the song "Only Wanna Be With You" had been one of her favorites ever since. Before I'd screwed up, she had even called it one of the best songs to describe our relationship.

This time the smile that she gave upon recognizing the song was unmistakable despite the fact that she tried to look away before I could notice it. I could do little more than grin slightly at my small victory, not wanting to celebrate too much because I knew there was still much more work that needed to be done.

As the song continued, Kimberly maintained her gaze out the window, occasionally tapping her fingers to the beat against her leg or quietly singing a few words, but never once looking my way. Finally, when the song ended, she turned forward and said, "So where are we going now?"

Smirking at her, I replied, "You'll see."

Kimberly rolled her eyes. "Just tell me where we're going, Tommy."

"No," I said, shaking my head. "It's a surprise."

Scoffing, Kimberly countered, "Like you haven't surprised me enough today, right?"

Letting out a sigh, I murmured, "I'm sorry about that, Kim. I really am. I didn't want it to be like that, but you wouldn't even call me back and I just didn't know what else to do."

"Clearly," she muttered lowly.

Half-chuckling, I shrugged my shoulders and said, "What can I say? I was desperate. Be honest though; would you have talked or met with me under any other circumstances?"

"I don't know," said Kimberly distantly, looking away once more, "Maybe."

Again, I could tell from her tone and demeanor that she had clearly said all she wanted to for the time being, and so I did not push her to talk any further as we continued our drive for another few minutes.

As we grew closer to our destination I could see a slow change in Kimberly's expression, almost as though she was quietly piecing together where it was that we were going. We were only two or three minutes away when she said, "We're going to the go-kart place, aren't we?"

I did not reply, choosing instead to give Kimberly a teasing smirk as I shrugged my shoulders obliviously. This earned me an exaggerated roll of her eyes, but it also happened to be accompanied by what was easily the biggest smile that I had seen from her today thus far.

It seemed pretty obvious that she knew where we were going, and whether her apparent happiness was only the result of our destination, I still do not know. All I knew then and all that I care about now is that she was happy; the reason for her happiness did not matter to me even in the slightest.

"You know you're gonna kill me, right?" said Kimberly, still smiling.

It was my old passion for racing stock cars that had given me the idea to take Kimberly to a local go-kart facility as part of one of our first dates after we had gotten back together. Much to my surprise, she loved it from the get-go and even though she was not very good at it in the beginning, we ended up going back enough times that she could eventually give me a challenge. To this day, though, she still had not beaten me in a race.

"I don't know about that, Kim," I said, returning her smile. "The last time we did this you were right on my tail when I crossed the finish line."

"Yeah, and I would've passed you too if that asshole in the green car hadn't bumped me from behind at the last second," she replied defensively, a hint of that old competitive fire glimmering in her eyes.

Suppressing the urge to roll my eyes, I half-grinned and said, "Well, you won't have to worry about that today. We have all three tracks to ourselves for a full hour."

"Really?" she practically gasped. I just nodded my head as she went on, "That is so cool. You better not let me win though just to try and get back on my good side."

"Wouldn't dream of it," I murmured truthfully.

Like me, Kimberly thrived on competition, and since our chosen professions offered little in the way of it, we often had to find outside sources to quench our competitive desires. For me, it had been a combination of things; some, like the martial arts, are still a part of my life to this day, while others, like stock car racing, went by the wayside a long time ago.

For Kimberly, it had always been competitive gymnastics, but that part of her life had long since passed. Still, she had surprised me about a year and a half ago by asking me to teach her karate. And while she was not a black belt by any means, after nearly eighteen months of training for four or five days a week, she could have easily walked into almost any reputable dojo in the country and passed their test for purple belt status.

Anyway, as we pulled into the parking lot of the facility I could tell that Kimberly was genuinely excited about the next hour or so that we would be spending together. She even took it upon herself to teasingly bump me with her hip as we walked towards the main building.

"I'm gonna make you eat my dust, Tommy," she stated firmly.

"We'll just have to see about that, won't we?" I replied, throwing my arm around her shoulder and pulling her in for the quickest of half-hugs.

"Yeah, we will," she countered confidently.

I did not want to overstep any boundaries in my actions, but I was hopeful that a small and friendly gesture like the one I had just given her would not cause any problems, and I was fortunate that Kimberly seemed to feel the same way. She accepted the hug and then allowed me to release her; she did not try to pull away, but she did not hold on, either.

Hopefully, I could get her to do the latter by the end of the day.

As we walked into the building we were met with all kinds of go-kart and other racing related equipment. There were model go-karts all on one side of the spacious room, along with things like spare tires and such, while the other side contained items like racing suits, gloves, boots and helmets that did not have to be used exclusively with go-karts.

At the center of the room was a small kiosk with a cash register and a portly man in his early to mid-fifties standing behind it. The man, as emblazoned in red cursive on his black polo shirt, was known only as "Big Jim."

A former motorcycle racer himself, Big Jim's ponytail, heavily tattooed arms, long and scruffy beard — as well as his affinity for black leather — gave the impression of someone who wanted you to be intimidated by him, but Big Jim was about the furthest thing from threatening in the world once you got to know him.

And since we'd spent numerous nights racing go-karts, Kimberly and I had gotten to know him fairly well. Enough so that when he saw us walk in, he immediately gave a broad grin and walked around to greet us.

"There they are!" he said in a deep and booming voice.

"Hey Jim, how are ya?" I asked as we shook hands.

"Never better, Tommy. Never better," he replied, turning to Kimberly as he continued, "Look at you, gorgeous! Even prettier than I remember."

Kimberly's small blush was very much genuine, but she accepted his compliment with grace as they hugged briefly. "And you're still a sweetheart," she said, smiling as they broke apart.

Some guys may have felt threatened by this little exchange, but as I said before, Big Jim was as harmless as they came. He also happened to have three kids with his wife of thirty years and I knew that his compliment did not stem from any sort of interest in Kimberly. He was simply being a nice guy.

"So," he went on as he walked back around behind the kiosk, "you have the track from ten-thirty to eleven thirty, like we talked about. There's no one out there now, so if you wanna change and head out there quick, you can have a few extra minutes on the house."

"Hey, thanks Jim," I said appreciatively.

"Yeah, thanks," added Kimberly, nodding.

"No problem," he replied, smiling his normal broad smile, "You two have fun out there."

"Oh, we will," said Kimberly as we started towards the side door, "I'm gonna wipe the track with his this one."

Jim just laughed and allowed us to go on our way.

Going through the side door led us into a hallway with three separate doors; the two along the left wall were changing rooms, clearly marked with separate men's and women's signs, while the door at the opposite end of the hallway led outside and, eventually, to the tracks.

"See you in a few," I said to Kimberly as we reached the women's dressing room.

"Yep," she said simply before heading inside.

With that, I continued onto the men's room, and five minutes later I was back out in the hallway waiting for Kimberly. I had chosen an all black ensemble and was surprised to see Kimberly wearing all white when she walked out a minute later. The facility offered pink attire, and while it was usually intended for younger girls on family excursions or something of that nature, Kimberly was still petite enough to fit in the smaller suits with some room to spare.

"White, huh?" I commented, leaning casually against the wall as she walked towards me. "Personally, I always thought it looked better on me."

Rolling her eyes, Kimberly replied, "What looks good on you is the look of defeat you're going to be wearing after I make you look like an old woman with glaucoma driving to the grocery store on a Sunday afternoon."

"Wow," I muttered, shaking my head while grinning at her teasingly, "That was probably the most long winded analogy I have heard in my entire life."

"Shut up, Tommy," she fired back, smiling despite herself the whole time as we headed towards the exit.

Once we were outside, we were hit with an immediate burst of sunshine that had not been there before we had gone inside. Apparently the cloud cover had finally gone away after dominating the skies for the last few days.

"Oh wow," said Kimberly, apparently just as surprised by the sudden change in weather as I was, "It's nice and warm now."

Stretching her arms out, she closed her eyes and threw her head back, allowing her face to bathe in the sunlight. Whether it was going to the beach and sunbathing, or running along the trail through the woods behind my house every morning, Kimberly loved spending time outside just as much as I did, especially when the weather was so pleasant and inviting.

"Yeah," I replied, "That means you have no excuses after I kick your ass."

Kimberly gave me the "evil eye" and said, "Those are mighty big words coming from a man who isn't very big at all."

As she said this, her eyes had trailed below my stomach and then back up at me to gauge my reaction, which was nothing more than to laugh and counter, "I know you know that _that_ _one_ isn't true."

Giggling herself, Kimberly said, "Yeah, if there's one thing that I've missed about you, it's definitely that."

Playful banter like this — which was pretty much commonplace between us — continued on and kept us occupied the entire time as we walked across the long expanse of black asphalt that separated the main shop from the trio of tracks.

Soon we came upon the first track, a paved road course with fairly easy turns that was typically reserved for beginners. Both of us could handle it with ease, but I still thought it would be a good idea to get in a few practice laps because it had been awhile since we had been here. Kimberly agreed, and in less than a minute's time we were choosing our vehicles.

Again, this was the beginner's course so we did not have access to the faster karts, but I knew I would probably struggle a bit my first few laps and I did not want to give Kimberly any advantages in a real race, especially not after all the trash we had both been talking.

Now, even though these were the slower karts, these were not your average neighborhood go karts by any means. The slowest karts topped out at thirty-plus miles per hour and had full cages covering the driver for an extra bit of that real racing feel.

As I climbed behind the wheel of a black kart with white racing stripes along the side, I looked across from me to find Kimberly already seated in a white kart with pink stripes, her cage locked, helmet on, and her seat belt fastened.

"Hurry up over there!" she called out to me. "You move any slower and you'll start going backwards!"

Rolling my eyes behind my helmet's visor, I locked the cage behind me and then fastened my seat belt before firing up the engine, which roared to life with a thunderous rumble that it maintained the entire time.

Motioning for Kimberly to lead the way, I pulled my kart behind her and followed her towards the start line, at which point I moved over and came to a stop at her right. Turning to face her, I fought to be heard over the two engines as I yelled, "Five practice laps and then I kick your ass for real!"

Kimberly said nothing. She merely faced forward and then slammed her foot on the gas pedal, speeding off down the track before I knew what had happened.

By the time I realized she was gone, she had already developed a fairly large lead and I was grateful that these laps did not officially count. She would talk trash if she beat me, of course, and I was more than prepared to deal with that, but winning the real races was all I really cared about. That was where the real bragging rights were won.

Eventually I took off after Kimberly, but it was late in the fourth lap before I got into a position anywhere even close to her. As such, she crossed the finish line after the fifth lap several seconds before I did, and was already clambering out of her kart as I pulled mine back into the covered area where they were kept.

"Wow," said Kimberly as I climbed out of the kart, "Someone forgot to eat their Wheaties this morning. I'm gonna have to come up with a better analogy for you 'cause that old woman just isn't slow enough."

Laughing as I pulled off my helmet, I headed towards Kimberly and said, "We'll see who's talking after I smoke you on the real track."

"If that performance was any indication, you're not going to be smoking anything."

Again, this level of banter kept us busy as we walked towards the more advanced track. There was an off-road course as well, located beyond the second road track, but Kimberly did not like all the bumps and hills so we typically stuck to the others, which was the plan for today as well.

We were approaching the row of go-karts we had to choose from when Kimberly made another comment about how she was going to beat me. Stopping on the spot, I turned to face her and said, "Let's bet on it then if you're so confident."

Kimberly seemed to think about that for a few moments, glaring back at me with her hands on her hips until finally she replied, "Fine. What are the stakes?"

"If I win, I get a kiss," I answered, deciding to be somewhat bold. I was, after all, fairly certain that I was going to beat her thoroughly.

Again, Kimberly had to think about it before conceding once more. "And what do I get if I win?" she questioned.

"What do you want?" I asked.

"To go home," she answered emotionlessly.

Caught off guard, I stammered, "Y-you're serious?"

"Yep," she said, nodding.

Letting out a sigh, I remained otherwise silent for nearly a minute as I debated my current predicament. Did I really want one kiss bad enough to risk the entire day on a single race that I was in no way guaranteed to win? And what's more, if I accepted her terms and lost, I wasn't sure that she would give me another chance to show her how genuinely sorry I was.

At the end of the day, though, I had never been one to shy away from a challenge and it was my competitive drive that eventually made up my mind for me. We shook hands to seal the bet and then walked off to choose our go-karts.

I again found one that was black with white racing stripes, while Kimberly ended up in one that was all white. As we pulled to the starting line, I saw the electronic display board that showed the times of all racers and what lap it currently was. To my surprise, Big Jim had taken it upon himself to pre-program our first initials and last names into the top two positions on the board.

After taking a few practice laps that saw Kimberly and I neck-and-neck for most of the way, we stopped at the starting line once more, exchanged a bit more trash talk, and then returned our focus to the task at hand.

Watching as a column of red lights flashed in a descending line, I gave the kart some anticipatory gas and took off as soon as I saw the bottom light flash green. I could tell right away that Kimberly had not missed a beat either; the front bumpers of our karts were no more than a couple of inches apart at most.

As we moved into the first of several hair pin turns, I took the inside track and came out of the turn with a small lead that was quickly erased as Kimberly regained her position alongside me.

For the first three laps it remained like this. One of us would get a small lead only to lose it almost immediately. Neither of us wanted to lose, but I think it was my desire to keep Kimberly from going home that gave me the much needed advantage in the end.

We were halfway through the fourth lap, going into yet another hairpin turn when Kimberly hesitated just enough for me to go by her. Seizing every opportunity afforded to me, I gave her front right bumper a little clip with the back end of my kart, just enough to send her spiraling out of control as I continued past her.

In fact, it gave me so much of an advantage that I was already parked and out of my kart long before she had even finished her last lap. I knew my tactics might not have been the most honorable, but the desperation that I felt prior to today had done little in the way of dissipating and Kimberly's choice of wager had not done anything to help it either.

Having won the race in a definitive fashion, I felt that sense of being on Cloud Nine as I waited alongside the track for Kimberly to finish her last lap. However, that euphoric feeling quickly disappeared once Kimberly had pulled her kart in and gotten out of it.

Her expression was clearly one of anger as she stormed towards me. Throwing her arms up exaggeratedly, she held them there and yelled, "What the fuck was that? That was the biggest bitch move I've ever seen! I want another race; same stakes!"

I was not prepared for this outburst, but I quickly forced myself to recover so as not to let her think she had any sort of advantage over me. "Why?" I questioned, smirking victoriously, "So I can wipe the track with you again?"

"You may have won that race regardless, but you and I both know it wouldn't have been anything like that if you hadn't bumped me like a little sissy!" she countered, just feet away from me now as she continued her approach.

Laughing, I shook my head and said, "Fine, I'll give you another chance…but only if it's on the off-road course. Neither one of us have driven it before so its guaranteed to be a fair race."

"Okay," said Kimberly without hesitation. In that one moment I knew how badly she wanted to win, but I did not have much time to think about it as she continued, "But if you bump me like before, you automatically lose the race; deal?"

"Fine with me," I said as we shook hands once more.

With that, we started for the furthest course from the main building, neither one of saying a word the entire time. The silence was palpable; I could see the competitive desire in Kimberly's eyes as we walked and I knew that this next race would not be an easy one.

And though I would never have let her know, her desire to win so badly was actually somewhat hurtful. After years of friendship and dating, the fact that she wanted to get away from me that much was a very difficult pill for me to swallow, especially since I could not imagine a time ever coming when I simply could not stand to be in Kimberly's presence.

Still, I had made the bet and I was going to uphold my end of it whether I won or not, even if it tore me up inside to do so.

Now, since we were going to be racing on the off-road course, the go-karts we were going to be using were somewhat different than the others we had driven. These karts had tires designed for off-road conditions, but they also were a bit slower than the others and did not handle as well when driving at top speeds.

For reasons I still don't understand to this day, however, those all-important facts seemed to slip my mind in the middle our final race.

As neither of us had ever driven this course before, the numerous hills and bumps were as much a challenge for me as they were for Kimberly, and for three and a half laps the race remained extremely close.

At one point in the fourth lap, I somehow ended up with a fairly respectable lead, one that I could have easily maintained if I had been smart and driven conservatively. Instead, though, I saw an opportunity to increase my lead by speeding into a small hill that was sure to send me flying through the air for several seconds.

And fly I did…right into the side of a smaller hill, hitting it in such a way that my kart turned violently to the right.

Suddenly, I felt the kart turning in a different way, and before I realized what was going on, my shoulder slammed into the cage as the cart rolled onto its side. Fortunately, the kart continued rolling and eventually stopped in an upright position, but it was also facing the wrong way, giving me the perfect view of Kimberly as she sped by me.

I knew she had seen what had just happened, and part of me expected her to stop to see if I was okay, but that was a mistake I could not afford to make. My hesitation in that moment allowed her to increase her lead until it became one that was simply insurmountable.

By the time I got my kart turned around, my desire to finish the race had waned with the knowledge that I would soon be driving Kimberly home. At the same time, that competitive desire that had gotten me in this position in the first place would simply not allow me to quit without a fight.

I sped off after Kimberly, but there was no way I would catch up to her. I finished the fourth lap without ever seeing her, and went into the fifth and final lap with an incredible sense of disappointment that had settled in the pit of my stomach.

As I went into the final turn with the finish line just beyond it, I half-expected to find Kimberly standing there taunting me. But what I was not expecting was to come around that corner and see Kimberly's go-kart parked just feet in front of the finish line with her still inside it.

It took me so long to realize she had stopped that I was already crossing the finish line just as I slammed on my brakes. Skidding to a stop, I quickly unbuckled my seat belt, pushed the cage open, and jumped out of the kart, walking towards Kimberly as she exited her own kart.

"What was that about?" I said almost demandingly. "Why'd you stop?"

Kimberly did not immediately answer. Instead, she waited until I was standing right in front of her, at which point she looked me in the eyes and quietly murmured, "I didn't want to leave."

Dumbfounded, I opened my mouth to reply, but she had cut me off before I could get a word out, grabbing me around the neck and yanking me down to her level as her lips practically flew to meet mine.

If I was to tell you that this move had caught me by surprise, I would be lying through my teeth. In all honesty, I felt like the geeky kid you see in all the movies. You know…the one who's in love with the disinterested hot girl but somehow finds a way to win her affection by the end of the film.

Yeah, in that moment, I was definitely that guy. It was like I was kissing her for the first time all over again.

Her lips tasted even sweeter than I remembered — perhaps because I had gone so long without kissing them — and I returned her kiss with all the emotion and enthusiasm I could muster, hoping I could somehow convey to her all the feelings that I could not put into words.

I wanted my kiss to tell her how sorry I was; how deeply I loved her; how big of an idiot I had been and the heartfelt promise that I would never do anything like that again as long as my heart remained beating.

When we finally pulled apart we were both desperate for air, but we remained clinging to each other as though our lives depended on it, our foreheads pressed together while my lips hovered just inches above Kimberly's.

"You let me win," I breathed, holding her as close to me as I possibly could.

In that moment, I never wanted to let go of her again.

"I know," she said, smiling sheepishly. "Are you mad at me?"

"Beautiful," I began, using her favorite nickname for the first time in months as I ran my hand along the side of her face, "I am as far from mad at you as I could possibly be. I love you more than anything in the world."

Grinning broadly, Kimberly gave the simple reply of "Good," and then wiggled herself out of my grasp before suggesting that we return our go-karts to the overhang that they waited under while not in use.

We drove our karts into their available openings amongst the dozen or so others, and as we headed back towards the shop, Kimberly surprised me for the second time in less than five minutes by taking my hand in her own.

Smiling down at her, I raised our interlocked hands to my lips and kissed hers softly before allowing them to drop back into their place between us. Feeling the need to say something meaningful, I looked to Kimberly as we walked and murmured, "Kim…"

But before I could say anything else, she was speaking over the top of me. "Don't say anything, Tommy. Please," she began softly. After a brief pause, she continued, "I know everything you want to say and a big emotional conversation is the last thing I want to deal with right now. Everything I've done today is because I wanted to do it, but I'm not prepared to have some crazy heart-to-heart with you. Can you understand that?"

Swallowing hard, I nodded and said, "Yeah, Kim, I can."

"Thank you," she replied, giving my hand a squeeze. "And thank you for bringing me out here. I'll be honest…I wasn't expecting to have such a great time, but I really did. I don't even remember the last time I had so much fun."

"Good," I said, flashing a big smile. "I still have a couple more surprises in store for you, but for now, how does lunch at _La Cocina_ sound?"

"Delicious," she answered plainly while returning my smile.

With that settled, we continued back towards the shop while maintaining a fairly casual level of conversation, discussing some of the smaller things that had happened in our lives since the last time we had spoken. It was nothing important; rather, it felt a lot like playing catch-up after having not seen a friend for awhile.

Once we had changed out of our racing gear, we headed back through the shop and chatted with Big Jim for a couple of minutes before saying our goodbyes and departing.

From there, the rest of the afternoon was something of a blur. It was just past noon when we got to _La Cocina_ and after a few margaritas over lunch — tacos, enchiladas, and the biggest burrito I had ever seen — it was well after two o'clock before we finally left the restaurant.

My stomach was more full than it had been in quite some time as we drove through Reefside, which probably wasn't the best thing considering my next surprise for Kimberly, but I was determined to give her the experience that I knew she wanted.

After a few minutes of silent driving, Kimberly turned to me and said, "So what's next on the agenda?"

Smiling, I answered, "A couple of things. For starters, you might want to check the glove box." Furrowing her brow, Kimberly opened the compartment in front of her as I added, "It's the manila envelope on top."

"What is it?" she asked, hesitantly taking out the letter-sized envelope.

"Just open it," I said with an encouraging nod.

Staring at me for a few more seconds of silent contemplation, Kimberly finally shook her head and opened the envelope. At first, her expression was one of confusion as she looked at the envelope's contents, but then realization hit and her eyes grew wide as one of the biggest smiles I had ever seen from her crossed her lips.

"Playoff tickets?" she squealed excitedly, removing the two pieces of thin cardboard to examine them more carefully.

"Not just playoff tickets," I replied, grinning, "Look where they are."

Thirty seconds prior, I could not have imagined Kimberly's eyes being able to get any bigger, but to my surprise, they did. "Holy crap, Tommy!" she exclaimed. "These are right behind the Dodgers' dugout. That's unbelievable! These must have cost you an arm and a leg."

Shrugging nonchalantly, I said, "It's no big deal. Besides, it's the Giants and the Dodgers. I want to see this game as much as you do."

Even though we had both spent a fair portion of our lives living in Southern California, by pure chance Kimberly and I had both grown up as San Francisco Giants fans; me because I had spent the first ten years of my life in the California Bay Area, and Kimberly because her dad had actually been drafted by the Giants out of high school, spending five-plus years in the lower divisions of their minor league system before finally retiring to start a family.

Our mutual love for the Giants was just one of the many things that had initially drawn Kimberly and I together back in high school, and to this day we both still bled orange and black whenever baseball was in season.

"You honestly have no idea how excited I am right now, Tommy," Kimberly continued, surprising me yet again by leaning against the center console of the truck to kiss my cheek. "This is easily one of the best gifts anyone has ever gotten for me."

"Yeah?" I said, smiling as Kimberly nodded her head. Taking her hand, I gave it a squeeze and went on, "Well I'm glad you're happy. I was hoping you'd like it."

"Like it? Tommy, I love it," she said, wrapping her arms around mine as she laid her head against my shoulder. "I forgot how much I enjoyed these random surprises you always pull. You're literally the only guy I've ever dated who did stuff like this for me."

Grinning broadly, I kissed the side of Kimberly's head and said, "Probably because you've never had a guy who truly appreciated how lucky he was…including me."

Kimberly started to say something, but almost as if it was meant to happen this way, she closed her mouth just as the song that was playing in the background changed to a new one. Having put the CD on a random setting so that it skipped to songs that were not in their pre-arranged order, I had no control over what came on and I immediately cursed my song selection as soon as "My Favorite Mistake" by Sheryl Crow started to play.

The song, which was about a man who was frequently unfaithful in his relationship, was one that Kimberly always cited as an all-time favorite and I had put it on the CD because of that fact, but now I was wishing that I had not.

Kimberly had recognized the song from the very first chord and had looked away just as quickly, apparently not wanting me to see her reaction to it. Moments later, however, she gave a loud sniffle and I knew — mostly because I had only seen her cry a few times in our adult relationship — that she was experiencing a fairly profound level of emotion.

Without hesitation, I reached out to change the song, but Kimberly's hand suddenly seized my wrist just as my fingertips reached the dial. "Leave it…please," she whispered, not even looking at me.

Swallowing the lump that had formed in my throat, I nodded and managed to give a muttered "Okay" before returning my full attention to the road.

For nearly five minutes neither one of us said anything, but as the song started to fade out, Kimberly turned to face me and I saw for the first time that she had tears in her eyes.

"Oh, Beautiful…," I started, reaching out for her hand only to have it pulled away before I could take it.

"Do you want to know why I never called you back or anything?" she questioned, eyeing me somewhat sideways.

"I —" I began, not sure what to say. Eventually, though, I answered, "If you want to tell me, then yeah, sure."

Nodding once, Kimberly went on, "The guy I left you for back in high school…Kyle…he cheated on me three different times during our relationship, but I kept taking him back; partly because I was afraid of being alone, and partly because I thought that dealing with it was like my punishment for cheating on you. The third time was the last straw for me, though, and I dumped him. But out of my next five serious relationships, three of the guys ended up cheating on me, not including you.

"Eventually it got to the point where I felt like I couldn't trust any man on the planet. After Brian, my last boyfriend before you, cheated on me, I was positive that I was doomed to spend the rest of my life alone, constantly dealing with the same pain that I'd put you through all those years ago. That was a couple of years before we got back together, but then you came crashing back into my life and it was like everything was completely different. You'd treated me so amazingly when we were together in high school; plus, I'd seen firsthand the man you'd grown into and when I started to develop those feelings for you again, I finally felt like I'd found someone I could completely trust again."

"But then I cheated on you," I interjected, not needing to hear the rest, "And made you relive all the terrible stuff you'd had to deal with in the past." Kimberly looked away once more, giving only the faintest of head nods and forcing me to continue, "I'm so sorry I put you through that, Beautiful. I made a horrible mistake and I regret it with everything I have. I know it's probably no consolation, but there hasn't been a single day since it happened that I don't hate myself for what I did to you. You're the best thing that's ever happened to me. I would never put you through anything like that intentionally."

"I never thought you did it intentionally," Kimberly murmured, still not looking at me, "But you still did it and that's what hurts the most. I've been cheated on so many times and I guess I just thought it would be different with you."

That did it for me.

Without even thinking about it, I swerved to the side of the road and parked next to the sidewalk, yanking off my seat belt and hopping out of the truck before walking around to Kimberly's side. I certainly had not intended to scare her, but my actions were so sudden that I think I managed to do it anyway as I unbuckled her seat belt and pulled her out of her seat.

As soon as she was on the ground, I noticed her frightened expression, but ignored it as I gently pushed her against the side of the truck, took her face in my hands, and kissed her with every ounce of passion and love that I could have ever hoped to muster.

I'm not sure how long we remained like that — it felt like several minutes — but what I do know is that my adrenaline was pumping so hard that I did not even feel slightly short of breath when we finally pulled apart. Instead, my eyes instantly sought out Kimberly's, her face still in my hands as I quietly said, "I would do anything in the world to take back the pain I caused you, Kim, but I can't. I will never be able to erase what I did to you. All I can do is to tell you how incredibly sorry I am and promise you that, if you ever give me another chance, I will never do anything that stupid ever again.

"I've been cheated on a couple of times too, so I know what that pain feels like. It's horrible and I would never wish it on anybody and it tears me up inside that I did it to you because you were — and still are — the most important person on this planet to me. I just —"

Hesitating for a moment at the sadness in Kimberly's eyes, I took a slow and deep breath before continuing, "I just wish you could somehow find it in your heart to forgive me…to give me another chance. There's nothing in the world I wouldn't do to prove to you how much I love you, how much you mean to me and how sorry I truly am."

Kimberly's emotions were clearly conflicted; her eyes still held that same terrible sadness as before, but now, through that sadness there came a smile…a smile that I was certain was, at least on some level, the byproduct of my own confession.

"I do forgive you, Tommy," she admitted in a murmur. "I haven't been mad at you for a long time and that's what makes this whole thing so hard. My heart wants me to be with you more than anything in the world, but my head is telling me to run as far away as I can, and I just don't know which one I'm supposed to listen to."

Sighing, I reached out and took one of Kimberly's hands loosely in my own as I replied, "I can't make your decisions for you, Kim. The only thing I can say is that your head is going to want you to do the logical thing; the problem with that is that love is rarely logical. Other than that, you just have to do what you think is going to make you the happiest. Now, come on…"

With that, I took off for the driver's side of the car before she could say anything else. Once I was back inside, I checked to make sure Kimberly was doing the same — which she was — and then re-started the engine.

No sooner was she in her seat however, than she was turning to me and asking, "What was that all about?"

"What was what about?" I countered, feigning ignorance.

Rolling her eyes, Kimberly said, "You know what I mean, Tommy. We were having a pretty deep conversation right there and you just took off in the middle of it."

With another sigh, I nodded my head and said, "Yeah, I know. I just didn't want you to feel like I was trying to pressure you into making a decision you aren't ready to make yet. I understand that earning your trust back is going to take time, and I'm willing to put in as much of it as it takes."

Kimberly seemed taken aback by that momentarily, but then she swallowed deeply, nodded once, and replied, "I genuinely appreciate that, Tommy. I can't promise you what's going to happen between us, but I can say this…you're making good progress, and if I was ever going to forgive someone again for cheating on me, it would probably be you."

At that point, I simply could not contain the smile that I now wore as a direct result of her words. No, it was not a promise that we would try to make things work between us by any means, but it did succeed in giving me more hope for us as a couple than I had experienced in well over a month's time.

"That's good enough for me," I told her, giving her hand a quick squeeze as I maneuvered the truck back onto the road.

Kimberly just nodded, remaining silent for quite some time as we drove, until finally she broke the silence by asking where we were going. With a smile, I answered, "Remember that night a few months back when we got really drunk at that comedy club?" Again, Kimberly simply nodded, leaving me to continue, "Do you remember the conversation we had when we got back to your place?"

"Parts of it," she replied, "Why? What's going on?"

"At one point we talked about high school and certain memories we would choose to relive if we had the chance," I went on as though I had not heard her answer at all. "Do you remember the big one we both agreed on?"

Kimberly seemed to think on that for a few moments, wearing a somewhat confused expression as she nodded and said, "Didn't we say that we'd like to go back and fight a bunch of Putties in the park or something like that?"

"Yep," I said with a grin, "That's exactly what we said, and that's exactly what we're going to go do, too."

"What?" she exclaimed, staring at me with what was easily the most surprised expression I had ever seen on another human being. "You can't be serious, Tommy."

"Why not?" I asked.

"Well, for starters, there haven't been Putties on Earth for more than a decade," she answered plainly.

"I'm aware of this."

"Then how in the Hell are we going to fight them if they don't even exist anymore?" she practically demanded.

Grinning mischievously, I gave something of an oblivious shrug accompanied by the simple answer of, "You'll see."

Kimberly rolled her eyes, and for a moment I expected her to keep fighting for answers, but to my astonishment, she did not say anything else. Perhaps the few surprises that I had executed so far today had earned me back some of her trust; at least enough so that she was now willing to go along with my plans without seeming completely irritated about it.

Fortunately, it did not take us long to reach our destination, no more than ten minutes before we were pulling into one of the many open parking spaces that ran in front of a long row of seemingly empty warehouse buildings.

"This definitely doesn't look like a park to me," Kimberly muttered as I turned off the engine.

"Trust me," I replied, smiling. "I promise you…you won't be disappointed."

Kimberly just shook her head in obvious reluctance before turning to climb out of the truck. Moments later we were walking towards the warehouse we had parked in front of, a single black door marking the entrance to the building.

As we approached the door I began searching for the proper key on my ring, which I found fairly easily; soon thereafter, we were entering the warehouse, my hand immediately going to the nearest wall in search of the light switch.

Next second the warehouse was flooded in light, revealing to Kimberly a room at least twice as long as a football field, and roughly three or four times as wide, too. Clearly, she must have thought that I had gone insane, and had I been in her position I probably would have felt the same way.

We were certainly not in a park, and there were definitely no Putties anywhere in sight; in fact, aside from the two of us, the only other occupant in the room was a small table along the right-most wall that held a very basic personal computer setup.

"Okay, Tommy, the joke's over," said Kimberly, giving a sarcastic laugh. "Now, really, what's going on here?"

Starting towards the table, I looked back over my shoulder at her briefly and said, "I told you…we're going to fight Putties."

I could hear Kimberly's footsteps behind me long before she replied, "You honestly don't think I'm _that_ stupid, do you?"

But I did not even bother to answer. Soon she would see that I was telling the truth.

Once I had reached the computer, I had to wait a few minutes for it to power all the way up, Kimberly standing behind me the entire time while tapping her foot impatiently. But then I input a few commands on the computer and in a matter of moments her doubt and impatience had disappeared completely.

And just as suddenly as they had gone, so too had the entire appearance of the room. One second we had been standing in an empty warehouse, and the next we were in Angel Grove Park, almost as though we had teleported just like we had done so many times back in high school.

"What the —?" began Kimberly, but I was cutting her off before she could finish.

"Hayley built a program that allows humans to exist within a virtual-reality simulation. Back when the Dino Rangers were active, I had my team use the simulation for training," I explained, Kimberly nodding her understanding as I continued, "But I don't really get how it works, so please don't ask me to explain it any more. All I know is that I press this button on my key ring one time to start the simulation and twice to end it."

"So, what, you just press that button and Putties start coming?" she asked, somewhere in between disbelief and awe.

"Yep, pretty much," I said, nodding.

"Wow," Kimberly breathed, sounding quite impressed.

"Yeah, it's pretty cool," I agreed. "So, you want to give it a try?"

"Yeah, of course!" she answered without hesitation, "But shouldn't we warm up or something first?"

That was the logical thing to do, of course, and so for fifteen or twenty minutes Kimberly and I went through a series of stretches that eventually led to a brief kata and some light sparring. As we did this, she slowly discovered that, inside the simulation, everything was completely real.

The grass felt like grass, the trees like trees…at one point we'd even made our way to the edge of Angel Grove Lake where she found that the water was as real as it was in the actual lake. Unfortunately, the size limitations of the room prevented a complete re-creation of the park; the lake was only about one-sixth of its normal size and several portions of the park had been left out, but for the most part, it felt just like being in high school again.

"So," I said once we had finished sparring, "You ready to do this?"

"Are _you_?" she countered teasingly.

Smirking, I held up my key ring and pressed the necessary button to activate the simulation.

"Let's start walking," I said, "Makes it more realistic if they jump out and surprise you."

Kimberly nodded her agreement and as we started to walk I offered her my hand, hoping beyond hope that she would reach out and take it. And when she did, I could do little more than smile down at her.

In that moment, it truly felt like we were back in high school again. I could literally close my eyes and picture the myriad of times that we had walked through the park together, holding hands and basking in the innocence that was our teenaged relationship, completely unaware just how dramatically things would change in the years to come.

That lasted all of about ten seconds, though, and then we were suddenly surrounded by at least a dozen of the gray Putty Patrollers, who had descended on us from the trees above. They were a combination of Rita's basic Putties, as well as Lord Zedd's enhanced Z-Putties.

"Whoa!" yelled Kimberly, jumping back a step as I grinned. "Somehow, you never do get used to that, even when you're expecting it."

"Up and over?" I asked.

Kimberly did not even bother to answer. With a smirk, she simply took a few quick steps forward and then effortlessly launched herself into one of the most graceful corkscrew flips I had ever witnessed, flying over the Putties just like I had seen her do so many times before.

Taking my cues from Kimberly, I followed suit and threw myself into a front-flip that saw me land a few feet next to her. I was facing away from the Putties, though, and by the time I turned around, she was already engaged with at least four of them.

Having essentially trained Kimberly all by myself, I knew that she was a capable fighter, but I did not fully appreciate just how capable she was until now.

These Putties had been engineered to fight just as Rita and Zedd's had fought; they had the same strengths, the same weaknesses, and the same general tendencies in battle. But watching Kimberly fight them now was nothing like it had been during our Ranger days.

Back then, Kimberly had relied heavily on her gymnastics background while supplementing it with bits and pieces of martial arts that she picked up along the way; first from Jason and Zack, and later: myself, Adam, and Rocky. Now, though, it was the exact opposite; her gymnastics background had become a mere addition to her fighting prowess, something that gave her that little extra advantage in battle.

To be honest, watching her fight right there was one of the proudest moments of my life. I had taken what was essentially a blank canvas in Kimberly — minimal martial arts experience and no recent training — and molded her into a fighting machine that would have made me nervous had I not already been trained myself.

Seeing Kimberly in action was a pleasure very much like the one I felt on the number of occasions where I had helped a struggling student to understand something in class. For me, it was difficult to find something more rewarding than helping someone else succeed in a field that they would have had great difficulty with otherwise.

So caught up was I in watching Kimberly that I actually forgot that there were eight other Putties in the immediate vicinity, and I was soon cursing this fact in midair as I found myself being tossed towards a tree.

I felt the pain on impact as I slammed back-first into the tree, but experienced a new sensation as I slid to the base of the trunk and slumped against it; Kimberly was at my side, both of her hands enveloping one of mine.

"You okay?" she questioned, the concern evident in her voice.

Just like that, my spirits were lifted. "Yeah," I groaned through the pain, pushing myself onto my feet with a little help from Kimberly. "Remind me to tell Hayley to make the trees a bit more forgiving next time, though."

Kimberly just laughed as the Putties — at least twenty of them now — started coming towards us once again. This time, though, I was not going to allow myself to become distracted by Kimberly or her skills in the martial arts.

For nearly twenty minutes we fought side-by-side, doing battle with wave after wave of the Putty Patrollers. More would appear as we defeated the ones that we were already fighting, until eventually neither Kimberly nor I could throw even think about throwing another punch or kick.

Exhausted, we slumped against the same tree as I pushed the button on my key ring to end the simulation. Almost instantly, the park setting dissolved around us and was replaced by the warehouse, Kimberly and I now seated against the wall nearest the door.

"That was crazy," she breathed, half leaning against me, "So much fun, though. I can't believe we just did that."

"Yeah, pretty cool, huh?" I replied, Kimberly nodding. Deciding to take a chance, I casually draped my arm around her shoulder, and when she did not attempt to move it, I continued, "You know, I really miss those days sometimes. You and me, fighting side-by-side…it just — it never felt the same after you left; being a Ranger, I mean. You were sort of the glue that held us all together; Kat was a great Ranger, don't get me wrong, but she was never you."

Kimberly gave me a smile as her hand moved to rest on my knee. "I miss it too," she murmured. "Even when Jason, Zack, and Trini left, I never felt scared out there because I knew you would always have my back."

Returning Kimberly's smile, I pressed a single kiss to the side of her head and said, "I will always have your back, Beautiful."

Kimberly said nothing, but just continued to smile at me for a few more seconds. I noticed her eyes growing slightly watery, and she must have realized that I had seen this because she quickly closed her eyes, laying her head in the crook between my neck and shoulder while simultaneously wrapping her arms around me.

Selfishly enjoying the feel of being so close to her again, I did not attempt to say anything else or disturb her in any way; there was simply no chance in the world that I was going to be the one to break the very contact that I had missed so badly and for so long.

After quite some time, though, neither one of us had said anything and so I looked towards Kimberly and was surprised to find that she had fallen asleep, probably from the twenty-plus minutes of non-stop fighting. And while I had not intended to fall asleep myself, I laid the side of my head against Kimberly's and was napping within moments.

In the end, it was Kimberly who woke me up, shaking me into consciousness as she muttered something about a baseball game.

A baseball game…what was she talking about?

"Tommy, it's almost four-thirty and there's going to be traffic going into L.A.," she said as she continued to shake me. "We're gonna be late if you don't get your ass up and I do _not_ want to be like those Dodger fans who show up in the middle of the third inning!"

Oh shit! The Giants' game!

Within seconds my mind was clear and I had sprung to my feet. "Let's go," I said, subconsciously taking her hand as I led the way to the door.

It wasn't until we were outside that I realized I was holding her hand, and I regretfully released it as I sifted through my pockets for my keys. It seemed Kimberly was as full of surprises today as I was, though, because as soon as I had locked the door and turned for the truck, her hand immediately sought out mine.

As she had predicted, there was definitely a ton of traffic going into Los Angeles, and at one point the freeway became so congested that we literally did not move for nearly fifteen minutes. Truthfully, though, I did not mind all that much.

Yes, I was looking forward to the game as much as Kimberly, but a baseball game at Dodger Stadium — especially a playoff game against the Giants, their arch-rival — was going to make it rather difficult to continue the rebuilding process I had been working on since early this morning.

Still, when we got close enough to the stadium to see just how crazy it was, I knew that the game was going to be worth it.

Once we had parked, Kimberly quickly started to get out of the car, but I stopped her with a hand on her wrist. "Hold on a second," I said, using my other hand to reach into the back seat.

"Why?" she questioned, her brow furrowing in confusion.

Grinning, I retrieved a black shopping bag and set it on the middle seat between us as I answered, "You don't really want to go to a Giants' playoff game wearing a pink Blue Bay Elementary School sweatshirt, do you?"

Kimberly frowned somewhat and said, "Well it's not like I have anything else to wear."

"Sure you do," I replied, still smiling as I reached into the bag and pulled out two articles of clothing, both of which left Kimberly smiling from ear to ear.

"Oh my God!" she exclaimed as I handed her a black hooded sweatshirt emblazoned with the Giants logo. Immediately, she pulled her sweatshirt over her head and tossed it in the back seat. She had just started to put on the new sweatshirt when I looked to her and instantly started cracking up. "What's so funny?" she questioned with narrowed eyes.

"Your — your shirt," I gasped between laughs, pointing to what she had been wearing beneath her sweatshirt.

Looking down at herself in apparent confusion, Kimberly soon started blushing profusely when she realized what was going on. About a year after we had become Rangers, several different companies had started selling Ranger-related novelty products, and Kimberly just so happened to be wearing the very same tee shirt that I had bought her on one of our very first dates back in high school. It was a plain white tee except for the giant picture in the middle, which just so happened to be a giant caricature of my White Ranger helmet.

"It's laundry day," she muttered through gritted teeth. "I didn't have anything else to wear."

I simply grinned back at her as if to say _"Uh-huh, suuuuuure,"_ until eventually she just shook her head furiously and pulled the new sweatshirt on.

"So, is that for you?" she asked, pointing to the other garment in my hand.

"This?" I said, holding up the Giants jersey so that the front of it faced her. "On what planet would this ever fit me, Kim?"

The jersey was an adult extra-small, leaving Kimberly giggling slightly as she replied, "Touché, Tommy…touché."

"Yeah…it might be too warm with the sweatshirt, but here you go," I said, handing her the jersey. "Check out the back."

Smiling the whole time, Kimberly rotated the garment in her hands and dropped it almost at once as her hands flew to her mouth. Personally, I did not think the jersey was worthy of that kind of response, but I was definitely pleased with her reaction to it.

"It has my name on it," she murmured somewhat distantly, looking down at the jersey with an expression that conveyed both surprise and genuine happiness. "I've never had something like this with my name on it before…even in the Pan Globals…our jackets and stuff just said _Team USA_ on them."

"Well then now you have something with your name on it," I said with a grin. The jersey also had her favorite number — three — beneath the name, but I did not see the sense in pointing this out when she was already so clearly excited.

"Thank you, Tommy," she replied, throwing her arms around my neck as she pressed a kiss to my cheek. "This day seriously just keeps getting better and better."

"And it's not even close to over yet," I replied, winking as I started to fish through the bag once more. Grabbing the matching sweatshirt that I had bought for myself, I looked to Kimberly and waited until she had put the jersey on over her own sweatshirt before asking, "You ready to go?"

Kimberly just nodded, reaching out for my hand as soon as we had reconvened at the back of the truck, and with that we started towards the stadium.

Some three hours later, Kimberly and I emerged from Dodger Stadium the same way that we had gone in — holding hands — only this time we were walking amongst a sea of orange-and-black clad Giants' fans that we had befriended during the game, all of whom were just as excited as us following what would certainly go down in history as a game for the ages.

Not only did the Giants overcome a seven-run deficit in the last two innings to win the game, but somehow Kimberly and I had ended up on the big-screen in center field for a "Kiss Cam" segment between innings, an event that saw us booed profusely for our allegiance to the visiting team as we locked lips in front of nearly sixty-thousand people.

To make things even better, Kimberly had been the one to initiate the kiss, and as we walked towards the truck hand-in-hand, I was really starting to feel like there was still hope for our relationship after all.

Unfortunately, a Friday night in Los Angeles meant that traffic was almost as bad at ten o'clock as it was at five-thirty, and the addition of game-night travelers did nothing but make it worse. On the flip side of that, though, was the fact that we did not have to drive nearly as far to reach our next destination.

Kimberly picked up on this rather quickly too, probably because I went a completely different direction than from when we had come into the city. "We're not going back to Reefside?" she questioned curiously.

"Nope," I said, shaking my head. "I've still got one last surprise for you…"

"Does that mean you're taking me home after this?" she asked softly. I may have been wrong, but it sounded like there was a hint of disappointment in her voice.

Reaching out for her hand, I took it and said, "Beautiful, when I picked you up this morning I asked for one day of your time. By the time we're done with this next thing, it'll be midnight and I'll have had my day. Where we go after that is entirely up to you."

I could tell from her expression that Kimberly had understood the dual meaning that I had wanted my words to carry. Where we went after this last surprise was as much up to her as what happened between us in the future was.

Nodding her understanding, Kimberly replied, "So, should I even bother trying to figure out where we're going?"

"Nope," I said again, with another shake of my head. "We'll be there pretty soon anyways."

Kimberly nodded once but did not say anything, and for several minutes we drove in silence, until we eventually drove by a mile marker sign that read _Angel Grove — 3 mi._

"We're going to Angel Grove?"

"Yep," I said with a smile.

"Oh…okay," she replied, having clearly been expecting me to divulge more of what we were to be doing in Angel Grove.

Then the song we were listening to ended only to be replaced a few seconds later as a drum beat started to play, accompanied soon thereafter by a slow and almost melancholy guitar riff. I recognized the song at once, and as I looked towards Kimberly, I saw from the look in her eyes that she had recognized it as well.

The one time we had seriously discussed getting married she had told me that she wanted "You're Still the One" by Shania Twain to be the first song that she danced to at her wedding. Now that it was playing in the truck, I knew that she would remember its importance from the time we had talked about it.

The song spoke of overcoming adversity in a relationship, standing up against the odds even when everyone else thought it would be better to just quit and move on. More than anything in the world, I wanted to be the same guy for Kimberly that this woman was singing about, someone who was there for her even when it seemed like everyone else in the entire world was against her.

As Shania sang her line, _"They said 'I bet they'll never make it.' But just look at us holding on; we're still together, still going strong,"_ I slowly turned to face Kimberly and took her hand.

"Do you think we can still make it, Beautiful?" I asked in a murmur.

When Kimberly's eyes met mine a moment later I saw confliction, the very same confliction that she had mentioned to me earlier. Part of her wanted to give me another chance, but another part of her was afraid that I would betray her trust again.

I understood her feelings, but at the same time, I knew in my heart that I would never even think about cheating on her again as long as I lived. I just wished that there was a way for her to see inside me, to know that my love for her was sincere and that my mistake had been but a foolish, one-time occurrence that would never happen again.

"I don't know, Tommy," she replied softly. "The truth is that I've never loved another man more than I love you. When I'm with you, I feel like I'm the most beautiful, special girl on the entire planet. But trust is a lot like a crumpled up piece of paper; no matter what you do to smooth it out, that piece of paper just isn't the same ever again."

Sighing, I shook my head and said, "So what you're saying is that you don't think you can trust me again?"

Kimberly shrugged. "I don't know what I'm saying, Tommy. On one hand, this day has reminded me just how badly I missed you…how much I truly love you. But on the other hand, it's like…'What if he cheats on me again? What if I give him another chance and he does the same exact thing?' I guess deep down I expected more from you because I'd known what a loving and caring man you were for more than half my life. And because of that, it almost makes it hurt worse than the others."

I don't know what it was…it could have been anything in the world, but at that moment, I felt tears start to well up in my eyes. It had been years and years since I had cried; even on the night I told Kimberly that I cheated on her, I did not shed a single tear. Rather, I had been so angry with myself that I had spent the entire night taking out my frustrations on the punching bag that hung in my basement.

Now, though, it was like I was finally starting to understand just how much pain I had actually inflicted on Kimberly. It was like when you messed up as a kid and you're parents told you that they weren't mad at you, but disappointed in you.

Disappointed always seems to feel a whole hell of a lot worse than mad.

"I am so sorry for what I did to you, Kim," I said as a single tear slid down my cheek from each eye. "I would do anything in the world to take back what I did…and I'd do anything in the world to regain your trust, even though I know I don't deserve it. I just don't know what else to do or say anymore. I feel like I've done just about everything I can."

"I know," Kimberly said in a near whisper, turning her head to look out her window. "I know how sorry you are; and I know how much you love me because Jason, Zack, Billy, Adam, and Rocky have all been calling and emailing me non-stop for the last month trying to convince me to give you another shot."

"They have?" I asked, genuinely surprised.

Apparently my reaction had surprised Kimberly as well, for she looked at me blankly for a few long and silent moments before murmuring, "You mean…you didn't put them up to it?"

"Of course not," I answered firmly and without hesitation. "I'm a grown man, Kim. I don't need my friends to take care of my business. I talked to a couple of the guys about what was happening, but that was only because I couldn't talk to you about it. I never once told them to say anything to you about it though."

"I see," murmured Kimberly distantly. "Then I guess I owe you an apology as well. Part of the reason I never called you back or anything was because I figured that you had put them up to it, and it made me mad that you couldn't just give me some space after everything that had happened. At least that's what I thought, anyway. So for that, I'm sorry, Tommy."

"Beautiful, you have absolutely nothing to apologize for," I told her. "You would have never even been in that position in the first place if it wasn't for me. I'm just sorry that I ever made you feel like you couldn't trust me. There's nothing in the world that means more to me than you."

I gave her hand a squeeze as I finished speaking, but when she did not reply, I decided not to push the issue any further. I could only say the same thing so many times before I had to just accept the fact that she was going to make her decision regardless of any grandiose speech or action I might make.

Because of this fact, I started to grow skeptical about putting my final plan into action. Since the very beginning, this last act had always been contingent on how the rest of the day had gone. Ten minutes ago I had been confident that my last surprise would work, but now I was not sure if it was even a good idea to try.

Still, as we grew closer to our destination, I eventually made the decision to go through with it. I had never been one to let my fate rest in someone else's hands, and if this ended up backfiring in my face then so be it. There was simply no way in Hell that I was going out without putting up a decent fight…

Once we were off the freeway, I waited until we were a couple of miles away from our destination before pulling to the side of the road and parking. Turning towards Kimberly, I opened up the center console, extracted a black bandana that had already been folded over into a blindfold, and said, "Look out your window so I can put this over your eyes."

"What?" said Kimberly, somewhere in between surprised and irritated at my request, "Why do I need to be blindfolded?"

Fighting the urge to roll my eyes at the obviousness of her question, I calmly answered, "Because where we're going is a surprise; more so than all the others today. Please, Kim, even if you can't trust me with your heart…just trust me on this; after this last surprise, I'll never ask you for anything again, I promise."

Sighing, Kimberly muttered, "Fine," and then turned to look out her window as I reached across the truck to tie the blindfold. After making sure that it was secure and that her vision was completely blinded, I pulled back onto the road and continued on towards our destination.

It was only about ten minutes later when we reached our final stop, in the parking lot of what had once been the Angel Grove Boardwalk, the same place where we, the Rangers, had celebrated our victory over Ivan Ooze. The boardwalk, which overlooked Angel Grove Lake from the side opposite the park, had long since been closed due to the frequent monster attacks in the area, but the place itself was still as intact as it had been on the day that business had ceased.

That was the great thing about a city like Angel Grove. There was virtually no crime whatsoever; had the same thing happened in Los Angeles, the former boardwalk would have surely been vandalized beyond recognition. Now, though, it was the perfect place for me to make my "last stand," so to speak.

As I got out of the truck, telling Kimberly to wait inside for a moment, I looked around at the empty parking lot and was disappointed to see that the cloud cover from earlier had made its inevitable return. With a silent prayer that the rain waited at least a little while longer, I grabbed a small black duffel bag from the backseat of the truck and then headed around to Kimberly's side of the vehicle.

Setting the bag down temporarily, I opened her door and said, "Turn towards me."

When she had, I scooped her up effortlessly in my arms and then set her down on her feet beside me before picking the bag back up.

With the bag in one hand and my other at the small of Kimberly's back, I carefully led her around the boardwalk and onto the restaurant deck where we, the other Rangers, and young Fred Kelman had celebrated Ivan's defeat and the saving of Angel Grove.

The entire time that we walked she continuously asked where we were and what we were doing, but there was no way I was going to give away my last surprise, especially not when the big reveal was so close.

About twenty feet away from the edge of the deck, I set the bag down carefully and then continued guiding Kimberly until we had at last reached the guardrail. As I gently placed her hands on the top rail, I felt a sudden burst of remembrance as I recalled vividly what it had been like the last time we were here.

I could see the fireworks bursting in the distant sky…could hear the music playing loudly in the background, drowned out by the screams and hollers of the friends that surrounded me…I could even smell the perfume Kimberly had been wearing if I concentrated hard enough. It had been a perfect moment; one of the last that we had shared before her departure to Florida.

"Wait right here," I murmured, "And don't take the blindfold off. I'll be right back."

"Fine," she muttered. "Just hurry up."

Grinning, I placed a single kiss to the side of her head and then slowly started backpedaling to the bag I had left behind, maintaining my gaze on Kimberly the entire time.

Upon reaching the bag, I hastily took a knee beside it as I went to work on unzipping it and extracting its contents. As soon as I had the portable, battery-operated iPod dock in hand, I set it on the ground next to me, pulled out my iPhone, and sent a quick text message to Hayley that read, very simply, _"Two minutes."_

With that, I began searching through the iPod application of my phone until I had found the song I was looking for, at which point I attached the iPod to the dock, turned the volume up as loud as it would go, and pressed "Play."

I was already walking back towards Kimberly when the first chords to Van Halen's "Dreams" started to play; I could see her flinch ever so slightly as she realized what the song was, the same song that had been playing during the fireworks show so many years ago.

Stepping up behind her, I wrapped one arm around her waist and pulled her in close while using my other hand to loosen the blindfold's knot. "I'm taking it off now, okay?" I said softly, kissing the back of her head.

"Okay," she said just as quietly.

Pulling the blindfold away from her face, I tucked it into my back pocket and gave her a few moments to take in her surroundings. There were no longer any lights on the boardwalk, so it was not easy to see much of anything, but the lights from the city skyscrapers across the lake gave our location away almost immediately.

"What are we —?" she started, but I cut her off before she could finish.

"Shh," I said, pointing into the distance over her shoulder, "Just watch."

Less than ten seconds later, a whistling noise could be hear from somewhere over the lake, followed moments later by a streak of bright white light racing across the sky. Next moment, several more fireworks were launched into the air, culminating in a vibrant explosion of multi-colored spark showers raining down from high above us.

"Oh, wow," Kimberly breathed, taking in the beauty of the lights as they illuminated the sky for a brief moment and then fizzled out only to be replaced by more.

For the next few minutes we remained there in silence, me standing behind Kimberly with my hands resting on the rail next to hers, forming something of a box around her as we observed the fireworks display.

Having planned this with Hayley long ago, I could tell when my moment was coming by the colors of the fireworks, which were now exclusively white and pink and were being shot into the air side-by-side. I counted each and every round of fireworks that went up from that point, and once I had reached ten, I slowly stepped away from the guardrail, hoping Kimberly would either not notice or not care.

Thankfully, she did not look back.

For just the briefest of moments, the fireworks seemed to stop, but then a piercing whistle filled the air once more as dozens upon dozens of the miniature explosives were all launched into the air at once.

I don't think Kimberly realized what was happening at first, because she tilted her head to the side in a way that made her seem confused, but then she quickly straightened up as it became apparent that the fireworks were spelling out words.

"_I'M SORRY,"_ went up first.

"_I LOVE YOU," _came a few seconds later.

And then finally, the last ace I had up my sleeve, the words, _"WILL YOU MARRY ME?"_

"What the —?" began Kimberly, whipping around to face me. "Oh!" she half-squeaked, her hands flying to her mouth. I was on one knee just feet in front of her, holding open an all-white box which contained the ring that I had spent hours upon hours trying to choose.

"I know I screwed up, Beautiful," I began in a low murmur. "But your love means more to me than anything in the world and I will spend the rest of my life proving it to you if you'll give me the chance. I know I don't deserve it, but would you make me the happiest man in the world and be my wife?"

When I had planned this in my head, Kimberly gave an immediate yes, at which point we proceeded to kiss passionately on the deck for quite some time before eventually driving back to my house where we would then make love until neither of us could even _think_ about moving more than an inch or two for a very long time.

If only I could have been so lucky.

Staring back at me as tears formed in her eyes, Kimberly appeared as though she was trying to say something but could simply not find the words that she was searching for. Looking around awkwardly, she finally brought her gaze back to me, gave me one last fleeting look, and then took off for the opposite end of the deck just as the clouds opened up once more.

"Kim, wait!" I called out as the rain began to fall, springing onto my feet at once to give chase. "Beautiful, please stop!" I tried again as she headed for the staircase that led to the beach below. She did not stop, though, nor did she show even the slightest signs of slowing down as I continued to run after her.

Losing sight of her in the darkness, it was not until I reached the large stretch of beach that I finally found her again, standing under the boardwalk with her back to me as she leaned against one of the wooden pillars supporting the deck above her. She was not nearly as wet as I was, but not dry by any means either.

Approaching her from behind, I laid a hand on her shoulder and quickly started to apologize, but she shrugged my hand away and then spun around to look at me with tears streaming down her face. "What the Hell were you thinking, Tommy?" she demanded, almost angrily, "That you could just propose to me and I'd forget everything that happened?"

"What?" I replied blankly. "No…no, of course not," I continued, shaking my head. "I just — I thought if you could see that I was willing to commit to you forever…"

Kimberly scoffed. "And you expected me to take that seriously? How can I marry someone that I can't even trust?"

Rolling my eyes in frustration, I said, "You _can_ trust me, Kim. You're just not willing to. There's a big difference. Yes, I cheated on you…_one time_. I also came to you as soon as you got home and told you everything that happened. I didn't have to do that, and you probably never would have figured it out otherwise, but I thought if I was completely honest with you, you would see that I had just made a stupid mistake that would never happen again."

"But how do I know it won't happen again, Tommy?" she practically yelled. "You tell me how I'm supposed to trust you after what you did!"

In that moment, something inside me snapped. Taking her by the shoulders, I moved her up against the pillar she had been leaning on earlier and held her there firmly, staring into her eyes as I replied, "You can trust me because you know who I am! You know the real man, not the mistake he made! Dammit, Kim…why can't you see that what I did was a one-time thing? I fucked up in one of the worst ways imaginable, I know that. I was drunk and I made a mistake. And before today, I hadn't even looked at alcohol since that night. I will spend every moment for the rest of my life proving to you how much you mean to me if you could just find it in your heart to give me one more chance."

I could hear the pleading desperation in my voice as Kimberly's gaze remained attached to mine, but the moment that I had finished speaking, she immediately turned her attention to the sand at her feet. Then, with a sigh, she murmured, "It's just not that simple, Tommy."

"Yes, it is!" I argued. "You just won't let it be. Everyone makes mistakes, Kim; and yes, mine was monumentally bigger than the average screw-up, but you've always been the type of person to give other people second chances. Why am I the only person in your life who can't have one?"

"Because you were supposed to be the only person who didn't need one," she muttered, still not looking at me.

"Fine," I said in exasperation, releasing my hold on her as I took a few steps back. "Have it your way, then. I've done everything that I could possibly think of to show you how just sorry I am and it's obviously just not working. I'm sorry I'm not perfect." Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out the truck keys and tossed them at her feet. "Drive yourself home whenever you're ready. I'll take a cab."

With that, I turned away from her and started back towards the staircase some fifty-plus feet away. I had only just reached base of the steps when I heard Kimberly yelling after me through the rain, "So that's it? You're just giving up on me?"

Slowly turning around to find her about twenty feet away from me, I shook my head and said, "I will never give up on you, Kim. No matter what happens, I will always be there for you. But I've spent the entire day pouring my heart out to you, trying as hard as I possibly could to make things right…at this point, I honestly feel like you're the one who's giving up on me."

Kimberly seemed caught off guard by the bluntness of my comment, and when she did not say anything, I again turned to leave. "Tommy, wait!" she called out just as I had started to ascend the steps once more.

"What, Kim?" I shouted. "I'm not gonna keep doing this with you! If you need a friend in the future, I'm there for you, but you've made it abundantly clear what you want right now and it obviously isn't me!"

"What if it is?"

"What if what —?" I started to ask in confusion.

"What if I do want you?" she said over the top of me, our eyes meeting as the rain continued to fall all around us.

"Please don't play games with me right now, Kim," I replied, shaking my head. "I just don't have it in me anymore."

Kimberly smiled as she started walking towards me. "I'm not playing games, Tommy," she began. I took a few steps in her direction too, and once we were in front of each other, she took one of my hands and went on, "This last month has been one of the most miserable times of my entire life, but in one day you somehow found a way to remind me what it felt like to be loved unconditionally. I forgive you, Tommy, and if you tell me that you'll never cheat on me again, then I believe you."

"R-really?" I sputtered, unable to believe what I was hearing.

"Yeah," she replied, nodding as she smiled and gave her bottom lip that little bite that I loved so damn much. "Now get back on your knees and re-propose so we can do this the right way."

With the biggest smile that I could muster, I retrieved the ring box from my pocket and flipped it open as I took a knee in front of her once more. Neither one us cared even slightly that we were in the middle of what had now become a rather torrential downpour.

"Beautiful," I began, taking her left hand, "You mean everything in the world to me. When I look at you, I see the woman that I want to raise a family with…the woman I want to grow old and spend the rest of my life with….Kimberly Ann Hart, would you please do me the honor of being my wife?"

With tears brimming in her eyes and a smile on her face, Kimberly nodded vehemently and said, "Yes, Tommy…yes. There is nothing I want more than to be your wife."

Truthfully, in that moment, I did not know what to say, nor how to react. I had five guy friends who had all successfully "popped the question" and I was soon cursing myself for not even asking one of them what it had been like.

Staring up at her with a dumbfounded expression on my face, I forced myself to stammer, "I — I honestly don't know what to say, Kim. I can't even believe this is happening right now."

Smiling, Kimberly replied, "Well, you can start by putting that ring on my finger."

Returning her smile, I nodded hastily and said, "Of course, Beautiful."

Slowly rising to my feet, I carefully removed the diamond ring from its box and then slipped it onto Kimberly's left ring finger, our fingers interlocking as I kissed her passionately.

Finally, everything was exactly how it was supposed to be.


End file.
